Galleries

Visits:

• National Gallery
• National Portrait Gallery
• ICA

Visiting a gallery is important when it comes to research because although inspiration can be derived from anywhere, it is important to see what's already been done. This helps influence work and generate ideas, and is a good start for gathering information. It also helps to see what's already been done, so you don't repeat something or make something too similar to what's already been done.

Galleries particularly trigger a lot of inspirational portal to open within our minds and teaches us a lot. Not only do they show canvases of art, they also contain contextual information about the paintings or photographs. A simple arch in a photograph or paining can really help inspire a person. Similarly, reading something or doing research on something there could lead to a string of ideas and get the creative juices flowing.

Personally, having gone there so many times, I've come to expect what would be at the galleries and not be too influenced by the work presented. I found myself walking through rooms I had been visiting for the past five years and knowing exactly what was n each of those rooms.

However, every time I visit I am always attracted to the painting An Experiment on a Bird in an Air Pump by Joseph Wright of Derby. I find the focused lighting surrounded by darkness very intriguing and the high contrast in the paining catches my eye immediately every time.

The fact that such a dark and slightly disturbing painting always seems to catch my eye says something about my fancies and possibly my psychological state. Though it is a dark image, is isn't as visually disturbing as some other paintings that have soldiers hold up a decapitated head of a another (Perseus turning Phineas and his followers to stone by Lucas Giordano), because I've seen the brutality in the image, it doesn't phase me too much. However in Wright's painting, what's being done to the bird is a mystery and since I don't know what's happening, my mind is automatically attracted to it so I can learn or solve the painting. The looks of distress on all the peoples face - especially the children - is questionable, because if it is an experiment on a living creature and if it's an experiment that's causing pain to the creature, why are the children being made to watch it?

I see how this could relate to my work through the sub context in the painting, because it is quite dark and almost traumatic, especially for the children who are watching it take place.